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Thursday, April 26, 2012

BARCELONA SETTLES FOR BIESLA AS GUARDIOLA SET TO ANNOUCE DEPATURE

Pep Guardiola is likely to step down as Barcelona boss at the end of the season and the club have already identified Marcelo Biesla as his ideal successor,

The former Spain international met with
Blaugrana president Sandro Rosell and sporting director Andoni
Zubizarreta on Thursday, and informed the pair of his desire to take a
sabbatical from the game after four years at the helm of the Catalan
giants.

Guardiola, who has led Barca to 13 titles since taking
charge in the summer of 2008, is expected to confirm his departure to
his players at a team meeting on Friday morning, and it is then believed
he will address the media alongside Rosell at a press conference after a
scheduled training session later that same day.

Consequently,
the club have set their sights on luring Athletic Bilbao boss Bielsa to
Camp Nou. The Argentine is out of contract in the summer and has the
unanimous backing of the Blaugrana board, as well as that of Guardiola,
who considers Bielsa the best coach in the game today. Indeed, it is
thought that Guardiola may even be asked to attempt to persuade Bielsa
to make the move to Catalunya.

Pep and Biesla shaking hands

Should the 56-year-old Rosario
native decide to remain at San Mames, Barcelona will then seek to
appoint someone from within Guardiola's inner circle, namely assistant
Tito Vilanova, former B team boss Luis Enrique, who is currently in
charge of Roma, or even ex-youth team coach Oscar Garcia.

Failing
that, Barca could turn to former Villarreal coach Ernesto Valverde, or a
foreign alternative, such as Germany's Joachim Low. However, the club's
directors do not believe it will come to that as they are confident of
landing Bielsa, their prime candidate for the position.